“In terms of human wealth and general quality of life as measured in numerical terms, the costs for that are also manifest and have largely been externalized, if not necessarily into the environment, where they often are, they're also externalized into the future, which is to say, yes, there is this huge surge in human population and relative wealth and so on and so on, but there is absolutely no reason to believe that it's sustainable into the future, especially not infinitely. Infinite growth is impossible. It's just not physically possible.”

Roy Scranton, is the award-winning author of five books, including Learning to Die in the Anthropocene: Reflections on the End of a Civilization, Total Mobilization: World War II and American Literature, and We’re Doomed. Now What? He has written for the NYTimes, Rolling Stone, T ...